Call it the march of progress: We humans have turned what was once wilderness into urban hubs up and down our coastlines. For decades, green space and shorelines have been filled in, paved over, or buried beneath mountains of trash in the name of urbanization.

But now, as the appreciation for all that’s green grows, coastal cities are pioneering ways to reclaim what was lost. Saving green space isn’t only about preservation: Repair can be just as powerful. These four waterfront sites along the East and West Coasts are modern-day pioneers. Built on former landfills, power plants, and industrial sites once defined by waste and pollution, these parks show varied approaches to recovery. Some lean into big infrastructure and adaptive reuse, turning old industrial bones into civic icons. Others take a lighter hand, letting wind, water, grasses, and birds decide what comes next.

In Seattle, locals stroll around Gas Works Park, improvise Slip ‘n Slide paths down its hills, and picnic at sunset. Its 19 acres stand as an influential example of infrastructure-forward reclamation. Built on the site of a former coal gasification plant on Lake Union, the park preserves much of the industrial machinery that once powered the city. Instead of demolishing the site’s towers, catwalks, and ladders, landscape architect Richard Haag reframed them as sculptural relics, insisting that the history remain visible.

The land held remnants of its past — coal tar and petroleum byproducts that were remediated with techniques like oil-eating bacteria to break down pollutants. The soil was then sealed beneath engineered caps. When the park opened in 1975, it challenged prevailing ideas and aesthetics: Industrial ruins were no longer something to hide but something to inhabit. Decades later, Gas Works still shapes how cities think about adaptive reuse.

A contemporary counterpart is taking shape in Norwalk, Connecticut. Manresa, a 125-acre brownfield site along Long Island Sound, was once a Jesuit retreat and later a coal-fired power plant that expanded the shoreline with ash fill. Over the decades, problems piled up, including an oil spill that damaged the tidal flats in 1969.

After the impact of Hurricane Sandy shut down the power plant in 2013, signs of ecological recovery began to appear. First one osprey returned, then others. Local philanthropists Austin and Allison McChord purchased the land, formed a nonprofit, and assembled a high-profile design team. Their vision includes restored habitats, beaches, thermal pools, and adaptive reuse of the power plant itself for swimming, education, and community space. The project still faces regulatory hurdles, but its ambition raises a big question: Can obsolete industrial infrastructure become the backbone of future public landscapes?

For a moment of Zen, those who live in northern California’s Bay Area can head to César Chávez Park. Tall grasses sway and rustle in the breeze. Birds flap overhead and across the water. Built atop a capped landfill hugging the eastern edge of San Francisco Bay, the 90-acre park resists spectacle. There are no monumental structures or grand promenades; just peace and a sense of what the area might have looked like centuries ago.

Once tidal marshland used by the Ohlone people, the site became a municipal landfill in the 1960s and closed in 1982. To repurpose the land as a park, the designers (local John Roberts and Seattle’s Richard Haag) adopted a light-touch approach, allowing wind, salt air, and native plants to sculpt the terrain. Trails skirt the landfill cap, protecting the habitat while providing access. The park’s restraint is intentional: Nature is not curated here so much as given room to return.

The most ambitious example of this breed of reclamation is unfolding on Staten Island, NY. While its part of America’s largest city, what was the Fresh Kills dump — the largest landfill in the world spanning 2,200 acres and holding more than 150 million tons of waste —  is far from the thrum of midtown Manhattan.

Closed to routine dumping in 2001, the site has been layered with soil and synthetic liners and outfitted with methane-capture systems and ecological monitors. Its future: a place for physical activity, public arts, and the appreciation of revived natural beauty. Designed by Field Operations, Freshkills is intentionally a time-intensive project. Native grasses, wetlands, and wildlife are returning, and methane from decomposing waste is used to power homes. It won’t be fully realized until 2036, but that’s part of the point. Healing land at this scale takes time. What was once a symbol of waste is being reshaped into a civic, cultural, and ecological asset.

Taken together, these sites tell a more complicated story than simple redemption. Reclamation doesn’t offer up a tidy, fairytale ending. Contaminants remain buried. Monitoring continues. Nature returns unevenly. But these parks show that damaged land doesn’t have to stay abandoned — and that repair, while slower and messier than preservation, can be deeply meaningful.

In different ways, each project reframes responsibility. Some preserve the bones of industry. Others erase almost everything but the terrain itself. All of them ask us to rethink what green space can be. It’s not just what we save, but what we’re willing to fix.